Postgame Quotes: Suns vs Celtics - February 22, 2009


Alvin Gentry
Steve Nash
Jason Richardson
Doc Rivers

Rajon Rondo

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Suns Head Coach Alvin Gentry

“First of all that is a really good basketball team with or without Kevin Garnett. You can see that they don’t have a whole lot of weaknesses. Every time we make a run and try it to get it with in workable spread, you know we got it within nine a couple times and they made a couple big baskets. Ray Allen makes a big basket, Paul Pierce makes a big basket, Scalabrine makes a three out of the corner. There is a reason they are the world champs because they are very good. I thought we played with a lot of effort, I thought we didn’t get in the open floor and run as much as we possibly could, I think that was because of the fouls shots because they shot 27 in the first half. It is one game and we will continue to improve and we are still going to play the way we want to play at the pace we are going to play at. There are only a few teams that we are going to play that are going to be as good as that team right there. We like our chances; we just got to continue to improve and continue to work.”

(On Boston out hustling the Suns)
“They did beat us to some loose balls and we talked about that. The one thing that we can’t do is get out hustled. They did get a little separation, made a couple baskets here and there. We had some open shots that didn’t go in for us and they came back down and converted again. With this team right here you have to keep the pressure on and we didn’t do that.”

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Steve Nash

“I think that we’ve got a lot of work to do. We came out of the All Star break and had one practice day and played four games in six days – so we haven’t had a lot of time to really sharpen ourselves in what we want to accomplish. And when you play a good defensive team that’s been waiting for us since Thursday night, they were prepared. They made a lot of shots and I thought they just outplayed us.”

(On whether the officiating played a part in the loss)
“I just thought overall they outplayed us. We didn’t get a lot of calls or bounces – a lot of their shots were going in and a lot of ours weren’t – but I still think the bottom line is they played better. They were prepared for us and they did a good job.”

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Jason Richardson

“We just kept on fighting and kept on fighting, but we didn’t have enough. They’re a pretty good team and with KG going down, it seemed like everybody on their team picked up their game.”

(On the difference between today’s opponent and the last three games)
“It’s a little bit different. We did some things right, but we also did a lot of things wrong. We’ve still got to keep on pushing – it was a good challenge for us today. The last three games, the teams had pretty much cashed in the season almost. (Boston) is a team that’s going somewhere and has a chance to win a championship – and we just couldn’t get it up there quite.”

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Doc Rivers

“It was a great win for us. We played well, played well together. Before the game, we really talked about offensive efficiency. They’re a great offensive team, but if we could get to the foul line and attack the basket and make shots and not force shots then they would have to take the ball out of bounds and that would take them out of their breaks. I thought that was as important as anything defensively. (On quick time out) We were doing what we were supposed to do. We were going to get blown out the way we were playing. These afternoon games, you can’t ease into them. One of the things we saw in the Oklahoma City game was you could get offensive rebounds on them because they’re trying to run. So on shots they were actually going back on offense and we told our bigs to just hang around. That was good.”

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Rajon Rondo

(Could you ask for a better birthday present?)
“No. Last year we played them and they beat us on my birthday. The game wasn’t over which is why he inserted me with 5 minutes to go in the game. A team like that can score a lot of points in a short amount of minutes. They made a run and we countered. Paul made a couple of big shots and I had a layup or two, but we did a great job of executing down the stretch. Guys step up and play their roles even better when Kevin is out. It was a team effort“

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